WoW Rookie: Soulstone and you
by David Nelson 
Dec 14th 2006 at 5:40PM
As a priest, pally or possibly a lower level shaman, you are often bestowed with the responsibility of a soulstone, giving you the ability to self-rez. And as we all learned from Uncle Ben in Spiderman, with great power comes great responsibility. If you have never had the chance to be on the receiving end of a soulstone, it is easy to make a rookie mistake. While it is by no means complex, there are certain do's and don'ts that aren't always obvious. With that in mind, here are some things to remember if you are given a soulstone...- If you are new to the soulstone business, odds are your warlock is too. If you have never played a warlock, you might assume that when a soulstone expires some kind of elaborate fireworks display appears in the warlock's UI, informing them that the group is screwed if they wipe if he doesn't conjure another stone. Without a proper mod, this is not the case. Odds are your new level 21 warlock friend doesn't have the fancy mod. So pay attention to your soulstone, and when you see it expire, or a minute or two before it expires, let your warlock know in party chat or in a /whisper. Your lock will usually appreciate it.
- Your group is wiping, the tank is dead and things don't look good. You have just been killed. There looks like there might be a small chance for you and the still-alive rogue to down the last two mobs. Should you hit your soulstone? Probably not. The idea behind a soulstone is a quick wipe recovery. Sure, you could use it to save the day. And you just might. But you also might fail, and cause a corpse run, or worse, the end of the instance in the case of respawns. Just stay dead. It is usually the best strategy. As you progress, you will get a better feel on when to rez in battle, but then you aren't a rookie anymore, are you?
- If you see that there is a very good chance your group is about to wipe, you should start looking for a good place to die. This is pretty easy. You just need to die so when you rez you won't aggro any mobs. Whatever you do, don't die near where you pulled the mobs from, as the mobs will reset to their original spot, leaving you dead under enemies, which renders the stone useless.
- Speaking of resetting mobs, make sure that all mobs have reset before you resurrect. Sometimes it is hard to tell, and it is always a good idea to type "is it safe to rez?" into party chat. A hunter may have kited a mob down a hallway or there could be a monster hidden from your view that you could possibly aggro.
So use your soulstone wisely. You are the last line of defense from the dreaded corpse run! And please, if any of you guys have some additional soulstone tips...please share!
Filed under: Paladin, Priest, Shaman, Warlock, Tips, Instances, Features, Guides, WoW Rookie
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Nexx Aug 20th 2009 2:09PM
Well. I have been playing a lock for sometime and I have found a few things that are critical to a lock.
1. You need to have a few shards before any raid/instance and keep making them during it.
2. SS'ing a priest or pally is always the best way to go (esp b4 a boss fight)
3. SS'ing urself is not a bad thing if u have an abundance of heals on a raid/instance
4. If ur levelling, this should be a mandatory thing to do. esp when ur getting above level 30-80.
5. Be careful of whom u are Ss'ing (Even an experienced lock makes mistakes)
6. Ask someone who has more experience (this is the only way to get better)
Hydraxis - Nexxordeth
Alexis Oct 28th 2009 9:39PM
My boyfriend's pally DI'd in the middle of Stormwind when we were just running around to our trainers haha
I just started a couple weeks ago but now my shammy is high enough to self-rez, and its awesome. We're playing a shammy-pally duo so we're pretty much unkillable and can rez each other (though he barely ever has to rez me, cause why the hell would i die before him when hes tanking) but sometimes ill self-rez and end up drawing aggro by accident... and then we get to run back. Yaaaaay.
Euclidius Jun 17th 2010 2:36AM
Re-reading this now, a few months before Cataclysm comes out, I have to make a couple comments to refine this column.
1) The CD for SS is now 15 minutes, down from 30. This also means the SS duration is 15 minutes. Allows you to get a SS on your healer sooner after soloing, but you also have to more aware of when it's up. As mentioned in the article, a good mod helps with this. I use ForteXcorist for this. It lists the CD's on all the locks in your group. Also has a summon assistant that helps get raids together quicker.
2) Druids are now viable, if not preferred, SS targets. Yes, SS the healer first, unless its a shaman. Shammys can self rez, druids can battle rez. So if you have a shammy healer, SS the tank if you don't have a druid in the group. But ask the shammy healer if he has self-rez yet. Druids have also lost the huge CD on their normal rez, so they are equally viable post-wipe rezzers as any class.
Thingy Dec 14th 2006 6:08PM
My favourite is always when a non-rezzer gets DI'd by a pally. Gotta love those mis-clicks.
Freehugz Dec 14th 2006 5:55PM
The "use soulstone" button is on the RIGHT not the left.
"we had ss up right?"
"oops"
Clementure Dec 14th 2006 9:13PM
And please, if you ask me to join you when I've been out soloing SM or something, don't be upset if I say "SS up in 17". Hey, soloing, I use it on myself!
Flux Dec 14th 2006 5:58PM
My warlock was running through Gnomer with a newbie priest. We have the inevitable wipe when we get to the dark iron dwarves. We're all like, it's cool - soulstone was up we'll just rez and go for it again.
I start typing "Don't rez yet" when I hear the bong sound. Uh Oh. The problem wasn't the mobs - they reset. It's just our priest happened to rez right on top of a land mine. *BOOM*
Sigh. Everybody run back.
Matt Park Dec 14th 2006 6:39PM
#3 - I did the EXACT same thing on my shaman in Gnomer as well, except it was even worse: I ressurrected before the fight was over and promptly got my ass kicked again. Then when everyone was dead I used my SS . . . right on top of a mine. The group broke up pretty quickly after that.
Ben Podgorski Dec 14th 2006 7:31PM
I've made this rookie mistake before. It was in SFK. Group broke up real quick after that, I don't reccomend it to anyone :)
Bokor Dec 14th 2006 8:34PM
I always keep a ss on myself when I'm soloing or grinding, but when in groups it always goes to a priest/shammy. Never a druid, they can only rez once.
But I LOVE when I'm not on my lock and the warlock in the group puts a ss on himself, the icing on the cake is when they don't think they did anything wrong.
Prauche Dec 14th 2006 8:50PM
One of my many alts is a lock and I had to ask a guildie how to bind the ss to someone. I couldn't figure it out. I would create the ss while targeting someone and nothing.... One of my more newbish moments. Just figured out how to do it this week during a Strat run on my main.... heh
admin@cliksingles.com Dec 14th 2006 10:35PM
A little known SS tidbit - if your druid battle-rezes your stoned priest - the stone is now useless. ANY rez (gnome jumper cables, druid, pally rez etc) wipes the stone. You might as well let the party wipe and wait for the mobs to reset and try again from a safe position.
Tomazed Dec 15th 2006 2:49AM
my recommandation:
Don't put it on priest if it can be on anything else...
I mean, priest, If they take aggro, can just be one-shot by any kind of mob :)
I choose by armor class, paladin comes first, then shamant and finally, a druid if possible...
lastely, if you see the wipe is comming, that you haven't put SS one rezzer and that they are dead, Hope for an ingeneer to be in the group and put it him.. with little chance, he will rez a rezzer :)
DWZ Dec 15th 2006 3:52AM
I remember my first instance run as a Warlock... The tank comes up to me and asks for a healthstone - no problem I think, so make it and trade it to him.
Then the priest asks for a soulstone, so again, I think 'no problem' and make one. I then open up trade and attempt to trade the soulstone with the priest... but it wouldn't work... Took me a few minutes before I realized you actually had to use it >
andy Dec 15th 2006 5:33AM
guys,
an old addon i used to use was fubar SnaFu. this addon ticks your soulstone, tells you who its on and how long till it expires, and makes an incredibly audible noise when the soulstone times out. it even communicates with other warlocks using the same mod and detects other soulstones in use. pity it hasnt been updated :)
tip: ever forget to redo the soulstone? smell an incoming wipe? while you are being bludgeoned to death, make it your last effort (sack the voidy, scream for power word shield, anything) to get that soulstone onto a res class, even if you die it saves the run.
tip: after soulstoning somebody, make a point to immediately create another one, bind the soulstone to your menu bar (so you can instantly tell whether you have one), and bind the create soulstone spell too.(be prepared).
tip: make the class aware of the stone and tell them not to use it until after the wipe (unless they are 100% their res will save the wipe) also ensure that they watch the timer. if it expires and i miss it, its their fault.
acariquara Dec 15th 2006 6:23AM
"you might assume that when a soulstone expires some kind of elaborate fireworks display appears in the warlock's UI, informing them that the group is screwed if they wipe if he doesn't conjure another stone"
It's called Necrosis LdC, it's been updated and a very scary voice yells "YOUR SOULSTONE HAS EXPIRED". Pretty hard to miss, and makes you jump when you are doing late-night Scholo runs...
Orizon Dec 15th 2006 9:38AM
Druids can also use there Battle Rez as a soulstone if they act quickly and the rez'd person knows what to do. Let's say you get a very bab pull and you priest, pally or shaman goes down with the druid still alive. The druid informs the rezzer NOT to accept the rez right away and proceeds to Battle Rez let's say a priest from a safe spot. The druid eventually gets killed and the mobs reset. The priest can then accept the rez and rez the others.
This saved us a corpse run in MC once.
Finnicks Daerkhiv Dec 15th 2006 1:35PM
I'm glad I'm not Alliance. I've never soulstoned a Pally in my LIFE.
But I'll tell ya, I've lost count of the number of times I've realized we're wiping, quickly created and cast a soulstone, which went off right as the priest hit 1%, then died.
That always brings much cheering, those last-minute Soulstonings.
Newt Dec 16th 2006 10:33AM
I never SS the Pally for the 'die safe' reason. Priests tend to hang about at the back of the party which also tends to be away from where the mobs will re-set to. Pallys tend to get in and hack and slash, meaning that if they die they do not normally die in a safe place.
So to poster 10. My recommendation is do put it on the priest, only put on a pally if nothing else.
Donner Dec 22nd 2006 12:01PM
My favourite is always when a non-rezzer gets DI'd by a pally. Gotta love those mis-clicks.
-Thingy
Lol I had that happen in ZG one we were fighting the panther boss and of course the pally DIs a hunter. On vent one of the leaders says "Thats a really intersting choice for the DI".